I would hope that fly fishing competition would not become like bass tournaments. It is one thing to attack a big lake where only a small percentage of the fish population will be "bothered," quite another to attack a stream where quite a large percentage of it could be be pressured. But in saying that, already you have to hedge and say, "It depends on the stream and how many completitors and "beats."

Then there is a significant cultural difference. What is seen as competition "over there" in Europe seems ok to me at the moment, given what little I know about it. But I wonder if their approach and values would be lost in translation in the U.S.

When your values and style of fishing produce means/ends reversals, which is what the U.S. bass tournaments strike me as doing, you have gone too far. That does not seem to have happened yet in the fly fishing competitions, but easily could.

I have not seen many innovations from the competition fly angling that I care to employ. Doesn't seem like a whole lot you can really "invent" other than inventing a name for a type of fishing that people have been doing instictively when called for.

Posted on: 2011/1/24 19:14

_________________
"... the salivary glands produce an estimated three liters of saliva per day."-- Pavlov

JackM wrote:I have not seen many innovations from the competition fly angling that I care to employ. Doesn't seem like a whole lot you can really "invent" other than inventing a name for a type of fishing that people have been doing instictively when called for.

Like I said before, Its not for everyone. But before you make judgements on how this if bad for the sport and the water you fish " especially if you dont know". let me give my 2 cents.1. Prior to fishing all comp anglers thoroughly clean there gear and boots to prevent Aquatic Nuisance Species (ANS) such as New Zealand mud snails, the whirling disease parasite Myxobolus cerebralis, and Didymo (filamentous algae) from getting into other water sheds. How many non comp anglers do you think do that going from lets say the Upper Deleware to the Little Lehigh.2. An comp angler is assigned a 200 yard section of water that he or she has 3hrs to carefully and methodically fish. That section of water will only see one other angler all day. That is 2 anglers on 200 yars of water all day. How do you think that compares to the little lehigh, Penns, Spring ect. Those streams can get like a zoo .So I think a 200 yard section of water that only sees 2 anglers all day is not so bad!!3. All comp anglers use barbless hooks and no weight on the fly line. Only flies are weighted. We are not allowed to touch or handle the fish and our nets can not be abrasive. Once a fish is caught its carefully measured in a half tube by your controller and gently released back into the water. I dont know about you but this dosent seem like its ruining anything.

I can sit here all night and write about this but im not trying to convince anyone that this is " The Thing To Do", only to try to let people know that this is definately not bad or harmfull to Fly Fishing and to have an open mind. I posted a video link from the 2008 America Cup. Check it out if you like.

Gfen do you not think there is anything you could learn by watching guys who fly fish competitively ? fly fishing competitions are not for everybody but just because you do not like them doesn't mean that you have to bad mouth them either. any kind of competition makes a person better in my opinion , kinda like the old saying goes "hard to soar like an eagle when you are surrounded by crows "

the problem is that those guys spend all their time honing tactics that allow them to take advantage of the rules that they put in place. i have no doubt you'll get better at catching trout based on a narrow subset of techniques if you do a few tournaments. However, there is a lot more to being great at fly-fishing than trying to catch as many fish as you can out of a 200 yard stretch of stream. mastery of a wide range of tactics is a far better measuring stick of the quality of an angler in my view. the tournaments don't seem to do anything encourage this.

troutslammer wrote:muskratnymph1 wrote:You don't have to compete, but come watch and I bet you will learn something.

Oh, you're inevitably right but you see, you're also wrong. You're so wrong, you've gone past wrong and come out right, that's how amazingly wrong you are.

Think about that, if the concepts of right and wrong were time-space, you've just gone through the worm hole, the tesseract, you've folded space like a third stage guild navigator and come out so far on the opposite end of wrong that you have to use the word right, even though its wrong.

Got it? That's how wrong you are.

I'd learn lots of things about things that are the inverse of anything that matters, and all it would do is further enforce the stunningly obvious Truth, of which I am right.

Quote:

troutslammer wrote:muskratnymph1 wrote:Gfen do you not think there is anything you could learn by watching guys who fly fish competitively ? fly fishing competitions are not for everybody but just because you do not like them doesn't mean that you have to bad mouth them either. any kind of competition makes a person better in my opinion , kinda like the old saying goes "hard to soar like an eagle when you are surrounded by crows "

Oddly enough, I challenge you to find my badmouthing competitions in this thread. I didn't. I just stated their a grandiose waste of time. A sort of fly fishing shared masturbatory experience in which dozens of men and women stand about and congradulate each other on a job each one could complete on their own without much in the need of congradulations.

Some people need that, some don't. I actually don't care if you do. More power to you because it doesn't impact my universe one bit. Sean is a fine example of this. He's made it abundantly clear that he can do lots of non-invasive things that are simply peachy for his life and lifestyle, and good for him. I wouldn't seek to take away one iota of his experiences, but should the universe snap its anthromorphic fingers one day and this entire competition thing vanish from our collective intelligence, you'll find that nothing would have changed because in the end, it didn't matter.

Yeah, 30' leaders. Woo!

So, as I said in the beginning, there's not a damned thing to be learned from competition, with the possible exception of things that shouldn't be learned. In through the out door; between Semtex and utopia; wasn't there yesterday, tomorrow not yet.